An adult look at a police detective.
New York City Police detective Joe Leland investigates the grisly murder of Teddy Leikman, the gay son of a politically influential department store owner. While investigating, he discovers links to official corruption in NYC in this drama that delves into a world of sex and drugs, homophobia, homosexuality and bisexuality.
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Grave, earnest, classical in form and bleak.
- gravecomic
- earnestironic
- classical in formformally daring
- warmbleak
- cooloverwhelming
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“Is Frank Sinatra the best thing in The Detective?”
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“Would a little humor have helped?”
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Reviews on TMDB
Written by TMDB members; each links to the original. Not part of Tastebuds's numbers.
- John Chardon TMDB · Jan 20197/10
Joe Leland - A decent cop on a murky landscape. The Detective is directed by Gordon Douglas and adapted to screenplay by Abby Mann from the novel written by Roderick Thorp. It stars Frank Sinatra, Lee Remick, Ralph Meeker, Jack Klugman, Horace MacMahon, Lloyd Bochner and Jacqueline Bissset. A Panavision/Deluxe Color production with photography by Joseph Biroc and music by Jerry Goldsmith. When a homosexual man is found mutilated and murdered, top New York detective Joe Leland (Sinatra) identifies who he believes is the perpetrator and coerces a confessional out of him. With the suspect tried, convicted and executed it appears case closed. Yet as Leland's moral compass gets bent out of shape, he finds his life, the company he keeps, and the case itself are revealing distortions of life changing proportions. Roderick Thorp would become a known name in the 80s when his novel "Nothing Lasts Forever" was adapted to screen as Die Hard. "The Detective" in written form is not as good as that novel is, so it's not surprising that screen writer Abby Mann took some liberties to smooth out the novel and produce a more serious and focussed narrative. There's no getting away from the "dated" tag
Read the whole review on TMDB - talisencrwon TMDB · Aug 20168/10
As I neared the big 5,000 in terms of movies watched (at least according to my admittedly-crapola memory and IMDb), for some odd reason, I thought of Frank Sinatra, whose films I had seen quite a few of recently, and I decided to check out the private-eye films he made in the 60's, when his superstar status, both in terms of acting and performing, began to wane, as tastes changed in that tumultuous decade. Apart from 'Them!', 'In Like Flint' and a truckload of Our Gang comedic shorts from way back when, I hadn't seen any of director Douglas' works, though he's fine with the material and does quite a good, if craftmanlike, job here. Sinatra must have been comfortable with him--they worked together earlier in films as diverse as Doris Day's 'So This Is Love' and the Rat Pack's 'Robin and the 7 Hoods'. I loved how he was obviously fascinated with Lee Remick's eyes and really took advantage of Panavision's 2.35:1 aspect ratio to show how captivated she was with Sinatra's Joe Leland and therefore couldn't dismiss him entirely from her life. It struck me, after recently seeing films from just a few years before, like 'The Manchurian Candidate' and 'Some Came Running', how Sinatra's party
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Cast
- Frank SinatraDet. Sgt. Joe Leland
- Lee RemickKaren Wagner Leland
- Ralph MeekerCurran
- Jack KlugmanDave Schoenstein
- Horace McMahonCapt. Tom Farrell
- Lloyd BochnerDr. Wendell Roberts
- William WindomColin MacIver
- Tony MusanteFelix Tesla
- Al Freeman Jr.Robbie Loughlin
- Robert DuvallNestor
Crew
- Gordon DouglasDirector
- Abby MannScreenplay
- Roderick ThorpWriter
- Roderick ThorpNovel
- Joseph F. BirocDirector of Photography
- Jerry GoldsmithOriginal Music Composer
- Robert L. SimpsonEditor
- Aaron RosenbergProducer
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